Tag Archives: light cream cheese

This is one of my favorite moments in the spring. We have a tree in our front yard that has burst into bloom and covers our yard in an a canopy of electric-pink blossoms. When the wind blows, soft petals drift through the air and settle into the grass like fuchsia confetti. I try not to stray far from home while this tree is in bloom, lest I miss a precious moment of our tree’s bold and reverent announcement of spring’s arrival.

In the back yard there isn’t a whole lot going on yet. Most of our 96 square feet of raised beds are looking forlorn and neglected. Even so, dandelions are anxiously popping up in the lawn and there are a few random leaves of lettuce and herbs that managed to re-seed themselves poking their way up in our raised beds. The exceptions are the 2 square feet which are abundantly producing our earliest perennial crop — Chives!

I swear that the first moment the sun comes out in the spring, these little troopers start growing like mad. They don’t give a rip about snow and frost. I love these dark coloured, mild-flavoured little toughies. I transplanted mine from my parents’ garden. My Mom and Dad tend an amazing flower garden in their partially wooded, partially sun-soaked yard on a lake in rural Northern Minnesota. They focus on flora and their only edibles are chives, rhubarb and my Dad’s small blueberry patch. They have always grown chives and my Mom sends me out to snip a small bunch to garnish baked potatoes and other dishes when I’m home. I love chives on potatoes, salads, and pasta and pretty much anything that can be heightened by the addition of a dark green garnish with a mild, onion-y flavour.

Our garden’s earliest offering provided me with the jumping-off point for our breakfast. I did a quick Google search to see what others have been saying about chives at breakfast time. I quickly found two breakfasts with chives in a starring role. The first was a recipe for Chive Scrambled Eggs by Martha Stewart. I don’t dig the thought of cottage cheese in scrambled eggs* so instead, I decided to follow inspiration and guidance in a recent post on a lovin’ forkful for our breakfast of scrambled eggs with chives and a grape tomato salad with a few tweaks of my own.

Tomato and Cucumber Salad, serves 2

1 cup grape tomatoes, sliced in half lengthwise

4 inches of cucumber, quartered and chopped

1 ½ Tablespoons Red Wine Vinegar

1 ½ Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1 ½ Tablespoons of fresh chives, rinsed and chopped

Fresh Ground Black Pepper

To begin, I went outside with my kitchen scissors and snipped a small bunch of chives from each of my two abundant bunches. There will be no shortage of chives for us this summer, but I still try to use each bunch equally.

Then I sliced about a cup of grape tomatoes in half the long way, and sliced a chunk of English cucumber into quarters and chopped it. I rinsed, dried and chopped the chives, and streamed a few tablespoons of Red Wine Vinegar and Olive Oil to dress the salad. I tossed the cucumber, grape tomato, red wine vinegar together in a bowl with the chopped chives and fresh ground black pepper and let it sit while I made the eggs. The time allows the chives, pepper, vinegar and oil to meld with the vegetables.

Scrambled Eggs with Chives, serves 2

2 Whole eggs, plus 4 egg whites, lightly beaten

3 ½ Tablespoons light cream cheese

2 ½ Tablespoons fresh chives, rinsed and chopped

½ Tablespoon unsalted butter

Once the salad was assembled, I cracked the eggs 2 whole eggs into a bowl, then separated 4 more eggs, and added only the whites. I measured the cream cheese into the bowl, and ground black pepper into the eggs. Most recipes call for salt at this point but if you add salt as much as recipes and food shows call for, you are going to consume way too much salt. There is no need to exceed healthy sodium levels in your diet. There are so many other flavors and textures going on in most meals that you don’t need to salt your food at every turn for it to taste wonderful. Once the eggs were adequately whisked, I melted the butter in a non-stick pan and scrambled the eggs.

When the eggs were just set, I sprinkled chives and folded them in while the eggs finished cooking. I like my eggs on the done side. I’m all for super-soft eggs that are made so creamy and decadent at the Birchwood Cafe, but if I’m not there I prefer mine to be fairly firm. With the addition of cream cheese, the eggs stayed moist and turned out to be some of the fluffiest eggs I have ever made. As soon as the eggs were done to my liking, I served them in a low dish, and served the salad in small bowls on the side of our plates.

This breakfast hit the spot. It felt as springy as the day. The salad had light, refreshing flavors and the eggs were fluffy with a subtle creaminess. Our garden’s verdant chives carried a mild and pleasant onion-note throughout the plate. This breakfast was satisfying and gave us lightness and energy to enjoy the beautiful spring day before us, missing not one precious, perfumed breath.

*I didn’t have any cottage cheese with which to try Martha Stewart’s recipe anyway.

Sometimes I come up with odd combinations of foods for us to eat for supper. Tonight was one of those nights. I came home with the idea of making macaroni and cheese. I didn’t want to eat a huge portion, but I didn’t want to go hungry with a tiny plate of pasta. We happen to have a fridge full of veggies and I wanted a salad that was satisfying enough to be a meal. I also wanted roasted veggies. These ideas danced in my head for awhile, and an idea emerged — I will make a salad, Mac & Cheese and roasted veggies and put them into the salad rather than serving the three separate things side-by-side. Obviously, pasta tossed into a salad is nothing new, I make this constantly in the summer for our back yard BBQ’s. I recently read a blog post about a tasty salad combination of Penne, Chickpeas, Sun-dried Tomatoes and baby Arugula on Skinnytaste which looks pretty good. I know I’ve heard mention of hot and cold salads. When Bjorn gave me a thumbs up to having a sort-of salad for supper, away I went.

I started by breaking off florets of broccoli and cauliflower to roast for the “hot” part of the salad. I tried to picture the amount I would want for 4 servings of salad so that I didn’t make too much. My goal is to prepare enough to feed us twice. Two plates at supper and then leftovers for lunch.

I dumped the broccoli and cauliflower, along with some sliced button mushrooms on a sheet pan coated with cooking spray, and threw it in the oven, which was heated to 425 degree Fahrenheit. I didn’t add any oil to the veggies. A drizzle of olive oil tastes great on roasted veggies, but I was planning to dress the salad before serving, so I didn’t use any. It really isn’t necessary.When you roast veggies without oil, they tend to char a little more than when they are tossed lightly in oil. That char is tasty.While the veggies roasted, I put a small saucepan of water on the stove to heat, and salted it lightly. While that heated, I chopped a half of a red pepper into chickpea-sized chunks, and rinsed and drained a can of chickpeas.

I assembled an assortment of greens. We had a great variety in the fridge. Our salad tonight had baby spinach, Butter and Romaine Lettuce and Pea Shoots. When the Broccoli, Cauliflower and Mushrooms had roasted for about 8 minutes I used tongs to toss it around so that all sides would get exposed to heat. I also added a few handfuls of whole grain pasta shells to the saucepan of salted water to cook until al dente, according to the package directions.

While the pasta cooked and the vegetables roasted, I began assembling the cold portions of the salad: two on plates for dinner tonight, and two in portable containers for our lunches tomorrow at work. I whisked a little balsamic vinegar with olive oil, and added a healthy pinch of red pepper flakes and a good shake of Trader Joe’s 21 Seasoning Salut to dress the salad.

When the pasta was done cooking, I stirred in a spoonful of light cream cheese, a small handful of grated sharp cheddar, and a shake of nutmeg. I didn’t go to the effort of making a cheesy roux for the Mac & Cheese. I just tossed the cooked pasta with the cheese. The cheese melted and coated the noodles nicely. It was easier to make this way, and actually better to have the pasta coated in cheese, rather than a creamy sauce, since I was planning to toss it into the salad.

I divided the roasted vegetables between our plates and two small containers for our lunch. I dressed the two plates of salad for our supper lightly and tossed them before adding the mac and cheese, since I didn’t want too much dressing on the pasta part of the salad. If I hadn’t been saving half of the salad for our lunch, I would have tossed the hot and cold vegetables with dressing in a bowl before placing in it on our plates.

I happened to use all of my homemade dressing up on our dinner portion, so I packed a small container of Trader Joe’s Light Champagne Vinaigrette* to take to work. I added a pinch of red pepper flakes and some grated Asiago so that the salads would still havea good flavor even without the balsamic vinaigrette that we had at supper.

Once our plates were assembled, we charged to the dinner table and dug in. I put out a nice chunk of Asiago cheese and a grater, salt and pepper for us to adjust the flavor at the table. A Hot and Cold Mac and Cheese Salad might sound a bit of an off the wall, but it was great. The balsamic vinegar and spicy red pepper flakes were a punchy contrast to the warm, cheesy pasta. The variety of colours was visually appealing. The crunchy lettuce and red pepper contrasted with the soft noodles and chickpeas. The roasted vegetables added warmth and charred flavor, and were roasted perfectly to retain their bite. Chopping, assembling, roasting, boiling, dressing and stirring together three different dishes raised a mild cacophony in the kitchen, that sung in harmony on the plate. I started with three ideas, and ended up with a meal that satisfied a hunger for Mac & Cheese, but kept the portion size reasonable, it was a plate packed with antioxidants and vitamins as well as great flavor and texture contrasts. We’ll make it again!

*Trader Joe’s Light Champagne Vinaigrette is my current grocery store salad dressing favorite. It contains champagne vinegar, white wine, Worcestershire sauce, and Dijon mustard, and clocks in at 50 calories for two tablespoons. It is light and zingy, and it is a legit way to have some bubbly at noon.